Child on the Home Front combines local history with amusing stories about growing up in the San Francisco Bay Area during the World War II and Korean War eras.

Child on the Home Front

Every good story should have elements of anxiety, drama, suspense or mystery, excitement, adventure, romance and comic relief. This book has all of the above. It doesn’t get much more suspenseful than waiting and preparing for a possible enemy air raid or invasion at the beginning of World War II. It doesn’t get more dramatic than being forcefully uprooted from homes and businesses and then being relocated to internment camps if you were a Japanese-American citizen.

Yet just because there was a war on didn’t mean a kid couldn’t get into mischief, like trying to drive a streetcar away from the car barn for adventure. And who hasn’t had an anxiety attack about going on your first date? Or how about being knocked to the ground by a snarling military German Shepard police dog for excitement? What was so mysterious about the Army’s occupation of the Polo Grounds in Golden Gate Park?

Growing up is hard enough for a young boy in normal times. But doing so on the home front during a major war like World War II, or even a small one like the Korean War, presents even more challenges.

You’ll enjoy reading about the adventures of this sometimes funny, sometimes bratty, but always entertaining, “Child on the Home Front”! Some might even say “Wild Child on the Home Front”, but you decide for yourself.